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Early site of successful Edmonton-born businesses Planet Organic and Earls may see redevelopment

DOUG JOHNSON Edmonton Examiner - The building which formerly housed the Planet Organic and, before that, Earls on Jasper Avenue near 121st Street is seen empty last Monday. The building hasn’t found a new renter since the former business moved across the street into a bigger location in January of 2016.

The future is unsure for an old building which formerly housed two legacy operations of Edmonton-born businesses.

The green and squat structure situated near 121st Street and Jasper Avenue has lain empty since Planet Organic, its previous tenant, moved their operation across the street into a larger, modern building in January of 2016.

Allard Developments, which has owned the building since 1997, has seen interest in renting the storefront but, so far, nothing has really stuck and renting it out has been harder than the company expected, a representative said.

The owners would like to find a tenant, but also ponders if it would be economically viable to tear the building down and redevelop it into something higher density.

The building, at different times, held two Edmonton-born businesses which have since found greener pastures in larger, more modern buildings as they’ve expanded across Edmonton and Canada.

It started life as a Fullers restaurant in 1971 and has a similar structure to what is now the Humpty’s on Whyte Avenue, another former location in the chain. The building stayed a Fullers until 1983 when the chain changed its name to Earls. The building was one of the earliest locations of the restaurant to open — the first being on Calgary Trail — until it changed hands to Cactus Club until the late 1990s.

Following that, roughly 1998, it was a Big Fresh grocery store until 2006, when the company became Planet Organic — it was one of the earliest sites in the city for the now multi-province chain of organic grocers.

Both chains who formerly possessed it have fond memories of the location, representatives said, but ended up moving out due to size constraints. Their old home rings in at around 5,000 square feet, compared to Planet Organics new, 17,000-square-foot location.

As a Planet Organic, the site had a decently-sized parking lot, but not enough room for a proper deli, and it also didn’t have a proper loading bay.

“It was a very successful location for us, despite its size,” said Alan Thompson, the company’s CEO.

Around the time Earls vacated the space, it also dramatically changed its aesthetic.

On a similar note, Earls locations had a dramatically different aesthetic for awhile. While now the chain has muted tones and candle-light, for a time they were “very loud, energetic environments,” they are now “more refined, cleaner,” said Michael Gange-Harris, Earls regional director.

Many old Earls locations were moved to bigger sites while the company transitioned its focus and grew in size.

“It’s a natural progression, but over time I think there is a loss of something, for sure,” Gange-Harris said.

That side of downtown is already becoming more dense by degrees, said Jeff McLaren, executive director of the 124th Street Business Association. While developments and re-zoning so far has been “ad hoc,” he said, the city is working on a cohesive plan to be released in the future.

“Obviously we’d like to see it developed in some form. A vacant building doesn’t serve the street or the area at all,” he said.

Historical designation is a far, far cry for the building. In Alberta, it usually kicks in when a structure is at least 50 years old or if there’s enough historical significance there: neither of which are true of the former Fullers.

But, according to principal heritage planner with the City of Edmonton David Johnston, it might not hurt to start looking at buildings from this period — which can sometimes be dismissed, like the hard concrete, brutalist architecture elsewhere downtown.

“I don’t know if there’s anything from a historic preservation angle that necessarily jumps out at people about (it), but in a roundabout way, maybe that’s why there should be some more interest in them,” Johnston said.

“These kinds of buildings are often torn down because nobody sees any value in them, but in 50 years, we’ll look around and wonder where they are.”